The Dehumanization, Criminalization, and Quadruple Murder of Trayvon Martin.

(Preface: As a matter of personal policy, I no longer blog or tweet about my political thoughts, ideas, and preferences. This case, one of murder, in my strong opinion, transcends politics and should be discussed by tempered minds. If you’d like to discuss this post with me, Tweet me: @ShaunKing. I wrote this on the 6 hour plane ride from NYC back home to Southern California.)

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Under no circumstance would it ever be acceptable to kill “this” Trayvon Martin.

His cheeks are too squishy, his eyes too innocent, his smile too bright.

Never-ever-ever would a circumstance exist in which it would be acceptable to murder “this” Trayvon Martin either.

It’s just a rule. Nobody is allowed to kill African Americans that snowboard. It’d be like shooting an eagle. You just can’t do that!

Even in the Deep South you aren’t allowed to kill airplane-loving Trayvon Martin either. Black folk that might join the military get a pass in 2012. Killing this Trayvon Martin would be deserving of public outrage, right?

And that’s exactly what happened. We saw his fat cheeks, his bright eyes, his infectious smile…we saw him happy in the snow, we saw him looking at airplanes and we were outraged. You can’t kill our perfect Huxtable-esque Trayvon Martin and get away with it. We won’t go for it!

Oh!!!! Then we learned that he was only armed with Skittles, ice tea, and some baseball cards in his pocket and we lost it! I mean come on! If Amadou Diallo was shot 41 times for brandishing his….drumroll please…wallet, then how much more outraged should we be when a teenager is shot with Skittles? (Sidenote: I never even thought I would use the words “murder” and “Skittles” in the same sentence.)

We were so outraged that it crescendoed past a tipping point. White folk were wearing hoodies to church to stand in solidarity with the hoodie-clad Trayvon Martin. Entire NBA teams were unifying and wearing hoodies. Marches and demonstrations were popping up in cities thousands of miles away from where Trayvon was murdered. The petition to arrest George Zimmerman, the shooter of Trayvon Martin, crossed 100,000 signatures, then 500,000, then 1,000,000, then 1.5 million…

Why? Because George knows Trayvon better than you do. George didn’t need to see those pictures. George Zimmerman didn’t even need to speak to Trayvon to know all about him. Hell – George Zimmerman didn’t need even need to know his name, because George Zimmerman knew Trayvon’s character just by glancing at him in the dark through the window of his Batmobile.

Listen to the 911 recording. Catching just small glimpses of Trayvon, psychic George Zimmerman said, out loud to the dispatch, that Trayvon was, and I quote…

A teenage African American

Very suspicious

Crazy and

An asshole and

He’s on drugs or something

George has skills like that. He doesn’t need to meet a person to make these types of determinations. He doesn’t even have to see them talking to someone else. George Zimmerman is so special that he can see a young man walking home and perceive him to be a suspicious, crazy, asshole. It’s amazing actually. George is special – gifted even.

But wait, I left out the most important part. George Zimmerman is so intuitive that he also knew, without ever meeting him, hearing him talk, seeing pictures, or knowing his name, George knew something about Trayvon that nobody knew…

George knew that Trayvon was, and I quote George on this….

“A fucking coon.”

Even George’s black tv buddy, Joe Oliver, suggested last night on MSNBC with Chris Matthews that George indeed said either “fucking coon” or “fucking goon” but I’ve heard it over and over again and George was angry and definitely said “fucking” in reference to Trayvon then a word that starts with “c” and is followed by “oo” and probably an “n”. Maybe he called Trayvon a “fucking coo”.

Just like angry, foul men call women the less offensive words “cun” and “bitc”, right? People say that all of the time, right?

Here’s what I believe happened based on the evidence that is available to us.

George Zimmerman forgot that he was the captain of the neighborhood WATCH. Emphasis on WATCH. Don’t get me wrong, George loved to watch. He had called the police 49 times in 2012 alone, but George was tired of watching.

In his own words, while looking at the “suspicious, crazy, fucking coon/coo/goon, asshole” that he knew Trayvon Martin to be, George, seemingly out of breath and now out of his truck, tells the dispatch that “they always get away” and that Trayvon had something nefarious “in his hands” (a snack). By “they”, George clearly meant the crime syndicate of “suspicious, crazy, assholes” that he knew Trayvon to be a part of.

When asked by the dispatch if he was pursuing Trayvon, George reluctantly said “yes” and was then told clearly by the police dispatch that “we don’t need you to do that sir”.

No longer needing the police because (neighborhood watch) Captain Zimmerman, armed with a pistol, is in pursuit, George hangs up the phone with the dispatch. Why? Why did George hang up at the moment the dispatch told him not to pursue Trayvon. Because George had crossed a point in that conversation where he was no longer going to do things by the book. He had already violated the wish of the dispatch officer. According to George, Trayvon, who had done nothing wrong, walking in his own neighborhood and minding his own business, was now “running away.”

George, through his attorney, now wants us to believe, that after being in hot pursuit of the “suspicious, crazy, fucking coon/coo/goon, asshole with something in his hands” first in his car, then out of his car, that he simply changed his mind, felt defeated, and walked backed to his car – when, out of nowhere like Harry Potter with an invisibility cloak– Trayvon rushes him, clobbers him, and beats the snot of George for the hell of it, at which George had no choice but to kill Trayvon.

Except, in all fairness, THAT MAKES NO SENSE and you and I know it doesn’t make sense.

***BREAKING NEWS ON THIS *** The lead detective in the homicide case of Trayvon Martin signed an affidavit the night of the murder stating that he did not believe that Zimmerman was telling the truth and that Zimmerman should have been charged with manslaughter but that he was overruled (via this ABC News Story). The qualified detective on the scene THAT NIGHT knew that this story didn’t add up!

Now, let me use my Morehouse College education and my African American Studies degree for a moment.

Trayvon Martin was not killed once, but has been killed four times…

The FIRST MURDER of Trayvon Martin was in the mind of George Zimmerman

This is not new. Murder and brutality normally takes place in the mind of the aggressor long before the victim feels it.

Before Africans were forced into slavery, slaveholders first created the idea that Africans were not even fully human anyway – so this made it ok to load Africans up like animals and ship them around all over the world to work until they die. Thomas Jefferson, thought to be one of the greatest Americans of all time, actually wrote that he believed Africans were part baboon (while he had sex w/ one… is that beastiality?) This wasn’t a wives tale – it was actually American law that Africans in America were just 3/5ths of a human.

See, men, women, and children were never intended to be treated as property and the only way the human psyche can even allow itself to brutalize people in such an ugly way is to first create the narrative that they don’t deserve fair treatment because they aren’t fully human or equal anyway.

This level of thinking has existed for hundreds of years in our country. People in power dehumanize others in order to allow their minds a physic, guilt-free pass while they brutalize and victimize them.

This is what George Zimmerman first did to Trayvon Martin. Before George Zimmerman ever confronted Trayvon, we have the actual recording of him dehumanizing this young man that he has never even met. Not only did he stereotype Trayvon, he lowered him into the less-than-human class of characters.

George Zimmerman, in his own words, made Trayvon into “an other”. He called him “crazy”. He called him “suspicious”. He called him an “asshole”. He had “something” dangerous in hands. He grouped him in with other criminals and then let his mouth slip and say what his mind was thinking when he called Trayvon a “fucking coon/coo/goon”.

The first murder of Trayvon Martin happened in the mind of George Zimmerman. He murdered Trayvon’s character. He murdered his humanity. He murdered his dignity. He made Trayvon out to be a monster.

THE SECOND MURDER OF TRAYVON MARTIN WAS AT THE HANDS OF GEORGE ZIMMERMAN

Now the equivalent of human trash in the mind (and according to the recorded words) of George Zimmerman, Trayvon Martin was confronted, shot, and murdered by George Zimmerman. It doesn’t matter if George mentored black boys and has a black friend on TV, Trayvon Martin disgusted him.

Told by the police dispatch not to pursue Trayvon, it is particularly suspicious that Zimmerman, having called the police 49 times in 2012, chose to no longer stay on the phone after he blatantly disobeyed the request of dispatch. While we do not have a 911 recording of George Zimmerman at the time of the altercation, we have a great (and rare) amount of insight into what was going on in his mind in the immediate moments before Trayvon was killed.

All logical and intelligent inferences suggest that George Zimmerman confronted Trayvon. Beyond it making no sense for Trayvon to confront George Zimmerman, Zimmerman already expressed to the police dispatch that Trayvon was running away and that George, himself was in pursuit.

Furthermore, George, speaking through his attorney, first stated that he had, curiously, decided to just go back to his truck, dejected, until he was shockingly and brutally attacked from behind by Trayvon. Now, today, speaking through his attorney, George has changed the story and said that he had not retreated but that Trayvon walked right up to him and punched him in the nose.

Not one eye witness expert saw what happened here. Not one. Nobody says they saw Trayvon blindside Zimmerman or walk up to him and punch him in the nose.

Eyewitnesses first say that Trayvon and Zimmerman were struggling on the ground and that Trayvon was shot, not next to Zimmermans truck, as he first said, but that they were as much as 30 feet away from the truck. How could they be 30 feet away from the truck if Zimmerman had retreated to it unless Zimmerman had not retreated at all?

I can only imagine how Trayvon felt. He had no idea who George Zimmerman was. According to his girlfriend, while they talked on the phone right before this incident, Trayvon expressed that someone strange was following him. He was right. She encouraged him to run away.

See, I’ve been followed and even chased by evil people before and I know how this feels. At least 4 times as a teenager I was chased in cars by racists in Versailles, Kentucky. When you are being followed or chased, you wrestle with whether or not you should run. Maybe you should just play it cool. Maybe if you run they’ll shoot you. These thoughts crossed my mind. Trayvon Martin then tells his girlfriend that he’s not going to run, but walk fast.

It is likely, then, that it is at this precise moment that Trayvon decides to walk fast that George Zimmerman tells the police dispatch that Trayvon is running away and expresses his frustration at how “these assholes” always get away. It was clearly Zimmerman that didn’t want the “asshole” to get away and not Trayvon wanting to have a face to face encounter with Zimmerman.

Trayvon’s girlfriend has expressed that while she is on the phone with Trayvon that it sounded like he was pushed. We’ll never know. I believe that’s exactly what happened. I believe that Zimmerman confronted Trayvon face to face, but, fat and out of shape, quickly found himself outmatched by the “suspicious, crazy, fucking coon/coo/goon asshole” that was Trayvon Martin.

That’s what I call pistol tough. I know what pistol tough is because I own a pistol or two myself. When you have a concealed gun in your waste, you momentarily forget that you are fat and out of shape because you know that you have something that can trump muscles, trump youth, trump height. Why didn’t George leave the pistol in the truck?

Make no mistake about it, George Zimmerman would have NEVER got out of his truck and pursued Trayvon if he wasn’t pistol tough, but he was. George Zimmerman had a loaded 9mm semi-automatic pistol. It’s a powerful gun. It will blow a hole right through a man. It’s a hand cannon. Most police carry them for a reason. It’s a weapon designed to put a man down with one shot. I know. I own one myself.

I believe that Trayvon Martin began to overtake and overwhelm George Zimmerman. This is what the eyewitnesses saw. Trayvon is what I call real tough – not pistol tough. He was fit. He was brave. As a child he once rescued his father out of a burning house and saved his life. The kid had guts. More than Trayvon even understood, he was fighting for his life with George Zimmerman and he was winning.

Speaking of the “Stand Your Ground Law” – I believe that it was Trayvon Martin that, regretfully, was confronted and forced to stand his ground. If Zimmerman confronted and provoked Trayvon but then begins to lose this confrontation, this isn’t self-defense or “stand your ground”.

Have you ever done that? Been forced to stand your ground against an unwanted aggressor? I have. It’s an awful feeling. George Zimmerman decided that he had had enough of this confrontation and decided to use fatal force, once and for all, to end this, and he shot Trayvon Martin in the chest. It appears that Trayvon died instantly.

Eyewitnesses are notoriously unreliable, but some say that after the shot they saw George Zimmerman on top of Trayvon’s back. Almost every eyewitness says that the screams they heard stopped as soon as the gun went off. Whatever was happening there – ended as soon as George pulled that 9mm trigger at close range. We’ll never hear the other side of this story because George Zimmerman made that impossible.

THE THIRD MURDER OF TRAYVON MARTIN WAS BY THE SANFORD POLICE DEPARTMENT

With every moment that passes, it becomes more and more clear that the Sanford, FL Police Department, with a documented history of racial injustice (the last police chief was removed because of a racial scandal just a few years ago), did an absolutely terrible job the night that Trayvon was murdered. The most important moments of a murder investigation are at the scene of the murder as soon after it happened as possible.

But here’s the thing, when the police arrived on the scene, it was, in fact, not the poor dead teenager on the ground that was treated as a victim, but it was George Zimmerman himself that was treated as the victim by the police that night and Trayvon as the perpetrator. Right then, on the scene, the police made a gut decision that George Zimmerman had acted in self-defense and was fully justified to shoot and kill Trayvon. But here’s the thing, gut decisions, we know from research, are actually based on thousands of learned thoughts and ideas. A gut decision feels quick, but it’s actually based on complex layers upon layers of opinions. Our gut can be righteous and our gut can be racist.

I can’t say that the Sanford police officers were racist that night. I don’t know. They believed George Zimmerman to be white (as written on the police reports) and they knew the dead body on the ground was of an African American, but here is where it gets so doggone ugly and where they may have made it impossible for Trayvon to have justice in death since he cannot have it in life.

The police never called the numbers on Trayvon’s cell phone to find his family and instead let him rot in the morgue for 3 days.

The police did not swab the fingernails of George Zimmerman to see if he clawed or injured Trayvon

The police, while noting that Zimmerman had blood on his clothes, did not collect those clothes to see if the blood was just his.

The police did not insist that Zimmerman, who felt that he had to kill Trayvon to stay alive, go to the hospital to have his injuries treated and properly documented

Then, in a total lack of regard for Trayvon Martin and for his poor family, they simply took him to the morgue and labeled his lifeless body as a John Doe for THREE DAYS!!! As is often done when a school aged child is killed, the police didn’t knock door to door in that gated neighborhood that night to see whose child Trayvon was. One is left to conclude one of two things….The Sanford Police Department either concluded, alongside George Zimmerman, that they, too, were looking at the body of a “suspicious, crazy, fucking coon/coo/goon asshole” that was up to no good and didn’t belong in that neighborhood in the first place OR they just concluded that nobody in the neighborhood would even care to know that this high school student was just killed.

After calling friends and family to see if Trayvon had checked in, his father eventually called the Sanford Police Department and finally found out that his son was murdered. Not only was he murdered, but the authorities knew who murdered him and the killer was walking free because it was deemed self-defense by the police.

Could you imagine this? My God! It is the worst case scenario of allowing your son out to go to the store alone, finally knowing that he is old enough to take care of himself, only for a man to track him down and kill him…not at the store, but inside of your gated community. WHAT???

This ugly truth outraged Trayvon’s family. It outraged his friends. It outraged a small group of African American activists in central Florida that had been fighting racism, even within that same police force, for decades. It outraged people in Trayvon’s hometown of Miami. As more and more people learned the facts surrounding his murder, the outrage grew exponentially. The outrage grew throughout black communities in Florida, then spread for 3 weeks among African Americans all across the country. Before it ever went mainstream, it became a central talking point on African American blogs and in the cultural hubs of social media. Nobody expressed any suggestions that this outrage was unwarranted until…the TIPPING POINT.

THE FOURTH AND FINAL MURDER OF TRAYVON MARTIN IS HAPPENING RIGHT NOW AT THE HANDS OF COMMENTATORS AND RACISTS THAT ARE BLAMING HIM FOR HIS OWN DEATH

After about 20 days had passed since Trayvon was murdered, though, something happened. The African American angst hit a tipping point. It crossed over into mainstream media and out of the cultural bubble it had existed in for the previous 3 weeks. A few celebrities that learned the story became angry. African Americans in the news media began covering the story on the radio and a little on television. Then dozens of celebrities became frustrated. A petition to arrest George Zimmerman that had been hovering at around 100,000 signatures started to double daily until 1,000,000 people signed it, then 1.5 million…

People of all walks of life began expressing their frustration. People everywhere, from all walks of life, started to come together. Just this past Sunday tens of thousands of church people, including pastors of all races, all across the country decided to wear hoodies to church as a sign of solidarity.

Now, in response to our solitary around the life of this young man, people are killing the memory and name of Trayvon Martin by doing the very same thing to him that George Zimmerman did before he killed Trayvon – except now it is actually much more sinister.

In a sick attempt to justify the homicide of Trayvon Martin and perhaps make it look like he deserved to be killed by George Zimmerman, people are now reporting all manner of speculation about the character of this young man. First off, he was a kid. He was in high school. Here are the things that I now hear being reported to dehumanize this young man. From reporting that he didn’t look sweet anymore to suggesting he was a thug, a sad movement exists to demean his character.

BEING REPORTED :: Trayvon was suspended from school for having an empty bag of marijuana with possible scraps in it.

MY RESPONSE :: So what? Bill Clinton said he smoked marijuana. George Bush snorted cocaine? How does Trayvon Martin having marijuana make him “other”, make him “less than”, make him a thug – when the presidents of our country have done so. This is an evil double standard. Unfortunately, way too many of our young people abuse drugs. Quit being self-righteous as if you didn’t do dumb stuff as a teen. His teachers reported him as an A/B student with a bright future. And – it’s not like George Zimmerman was aware of this. Get real.

BEING REPORTED :: Trayvon Martin had tattoos.

MY RESPONSE :: Half of the country has tattoos. Again, why does this matter if he did or did not have them. Why, again, the double standard? Did George Zimmerman shoot him because he had tattoos? No. Trayvon was wearing a hoodie and they couldn’t be seen, right?

BEING REPORTED :: Trayvon Martin was 6 feet,2” inches tall.

MY RESPONSE :: This is being reported to suggest that since it wasn’t little squishy faced Trayvon killed that BIG BLACK STRONG TRAYVON was much more a threat to our society. First off – that’s still not that doggone tall. Does being tall make him the “crazy asshole” that George Zimmerman deemed him to be? Jeremy Lin & Tim Tebow are each taller than that. Are they dangerous now?

BEING REPORTED :: Trayvon took a picture with his middle fingers up.

MY RESPONSE :: Did George Zimmerman know that? Have you never put your middle fingers up? It is it a crime? So stinking what. When I was a teen I cussed like Richard Pryor and flipped the bird all the time and I turned out just fine :-)

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I have to end this here.

Next week, I will blog my thoughts on where we go from here. If you’d like to discuss this with me, tweet me anytime @ShaunKing.